“Paul Levine, previously Trulia’s chief operating officer, has been named president of Trulia, reporting to Rascoff. Pete Flint, co-founder and former CEO of Trulia, has joined the Zillow Group board of directors, as has former Trulia board member Greg Waldorf.”

I think Paul Levine is a great choice. What I’m not convinced about is how long they will keep separate companies. Although, by changing the name to “Zillow Group” it does appear that they might stick with this strategy.

I don’t think it could have gone any other way for Pete. But, after selling his company for multiple billions, he deserves to drop the mic and leave the stage.

“In connection with the close of the acquisition, the companies eliminated approximately 280 positions, primarily in San Francisco and Bellevue, Wash., due primarily to redundancy in the combined company’s sales and administrative organizations. Another 70 positions will be eliminated as of the end of the second quarter, at which time Zillow Group will have approximately 2,000 employees. The approximately 350 affected employees have already been notified.”

As the saying goes, “that’s show business”. I was surprised this happen so fast, but I guess ripping of the bandaid was the best solution. Although Trulia did (does?) have a great company culture. I’m sure these “eliminations” hit the team hard.

Bottom line is that the other shoe has dropped. Zillow Group is now in place. Murdoch is still keeping his cards close to the vest. Grab some popcorn.

Interesting analysis about Nationstar, RED’s new owner.

Nationstar moves one step closer to total mortgage market domination
Jacob Gaffney, HousingWire.com

“Nationstar is moving one step closer to total mortgage market domination.

During the call, Bray discussed at length the acqusition of digital real estate marketplace Real Estate Digital, expected to close in the next quarter. RED is a fee-based real estate services company that provides online marketing, data, transaction management and digital media solutions.

“We intend to utilize RED’s capabilities to build HomeSearch 2.0, which will include search functionality and industry-leading residential real estate data,” he said. “This data will allow consumers, realtors and investors to research properties and more importantly, transact in a number of ways.”

In the end, Nationstar expects to provide end-to-end real estate and mortgage services with exceptional customer service, which will deliver “a customer for life,” Bray said.

In other words, total mortgage domination.

Search, sell, list, buy, title — you name it and Nationstar is going to provide it through its HomeSearch.com platform.

“Our macro goal is to capture a fee component of as many U.S. real estate transactions as possible,” Bray said.

Sounds like Zillow 3.0

And at another point in the call he adds this gem:

“We see an opportunity to leverage our heritage as a non-agency servicer to provide financial solutions to the developing market that could include portions of the nearly 68 million under-banked consumers and 72 million millenials in the United States. We are currently evaluating non-agency and expanded purchase mortgage strategies.”

That’s loads of money waiting to be had and Bray is convinced his company has an honest shot at a big portion of it.

And from what I know about Nationstar, he very well might be right.

I’m not too versed on banker speak, what does “non-agency and expanded purchase mortgage strategies mean”? I hope it doesn’t mean, what I think it means.

Thanks for the heads up @tcar